Mia has cerebral palsy because the doctors made a mistake. She can’t walk, talk, or use her hands; she is in a special class with other disabled students. However, she goes to class with the regular students for some subjects because, although she can’t talk, walk, or use her hands, she is super bright, speaks, and does school work with a computer controlled by her eyes. “Normal” students and people in society never realized how special she really was; they treated her very badly and said quite hurtful stuff right to her face.
Mia didn’t talk to anyone in society or her regular classmates because of the negative comments people made about her disability. So she usually just communicated with her disabled best friend, Joseph. They did everything in school together; they played jokes on the teacher; had wheelchair races, and even fights. When they got in trouble, they blamed each other, just for fun — but no matter what, they always had each other’s backs.
Mia was so happy with her best friend in their little world; she didn't care about standing up for herself and communicating with other people and the regular students; as long as she had her best friend by her side, that was all she needed…until one day, when her life was turned upside down forever.
One morning, Mia and Joseph were playing around in their classroom while waiting for the teacher to begin the lesson, when a bad man with a gun came into the room and said that people with disabilities should be all gone. He then took his gun and started shooting all the disabled students.
Mia quickly put her head down under her desk. She closed her eyes, and when she didn’t hear the gunshots and screams anymore, she opened them again. She saw a horrible red color, everywhere on the floor and walls. When she looked to the other side of her, there was Joseph and her other classmates, just sitting in their wheelchairs, not moving at all. None of them were awake.
Mia moved closer to Joseph and tried to wake him up; she screamed, cried, and yelled at the top of her lungs. Eventually some of the other disabled students woke up, but Joseph never did. The teacher was also hurt, but got up and went over to Mia and the other scared survivors to see how they were doing, and to try to calm them down. By this time, the police and EMTs were there, helping to make sure survivors were properly cared for and medically treated. The gunman was caught by the police, and soon everyone realized that he only targeted the one classroom – the class with disabled students. He wanted to only eliminate them.
For a few weeks, Mia felt like her world was falling apart and completely destroyed without her best friend. Although she wasn’t physically hurt, she was broken into pieces inside; she felt like the only sounds she heard were the horrible noises in her head from that day. She didn’t eat, sleep, or even shower. All she did was cry in her room and watch TV — until one day she saw on TV that the bad man was going to court. The judge would say if he was going to prison or not for what he did; but the newsperson said he probably wasn’t going to prison because society felt that the lives of people with disabilities didn’t really matter. Mia knew this was the only chance for her to prove to the world that people with disabilities’s lives matter just as much as every other life matters.
Mia stopped crying and went to the courthouse that afternoon. She found the confidence in herself to communicate with her computer in front of everyone there. She spoke about that awful day, and said although people with disabilities look and act differently, they are still humans, and every one of their lives is important. She explained how the man took her best friend away forever and how hard it was going to be without him — but she was going to live her life in his honor, and she was going to fight until all people are seen as equal.
The judge and everyone else agreed with Mia, and the bad man went to prison for the rest of his life. She got justice for her best friend and all people with disabilities, and most importantly, she found her voice in society and never kept quiet again.
The end..
